The modern communications era has brought about a tremendous expansion of wireline and wireless networks. Computer networks, television networks, and telephony networks are experiencing an unprecedented technological expansion, fueled by consumer demand. Wireless and mobile networking technologies have addressed related consumer demands, while providing more flexibility and immediacy of information transfer.
Current and future networking technologies continue to facilitate ease of information transfer and convenience to users. In order to provide easier or faster information transfer and convenience, telecommunication industry service providers are developing improvements to existing networks. For example, the evolved universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) terrestrial radio access network (E-UTRAN) is currently being developed. The E-UTRAN, which is also known as Long Term Evolution (LTE) or 3.9G, is aimed at upgrading prior technologies by improving efficiency, lowering costs, improving services, making use of new spectrum opportunities, and providing better integration with other open standards.
One advantage of E-UTRAN which continues to be shared with other preceding telecommunication standards is the fact that users are enabled to access a network employing such standards while remaining mobile. Thus, for example, users having mobile terminals equipped to communicate in accordance with such standards may travel vast distances while maintaining communication with the network. In this regard, it is currently common for an access point or base station providing network coverage for a particular area (or cell), to pass off communication with a particular mobile terminal to a neighboring base station when the user of the particular mobile terminal exits the coverage area of the base station. This process is often referred to as a handover.
Despite the evolution and improvement of telecommunication networks, the process of handover may not be entirely reliable in every situation. For example, a mobile terminal in communication with a particular base station may experience a radio link failure (RLF) due to poor channel conditions or other factors, making handover challenging. For example, if the RLF occurs before the mobile terminal receives a command to handover to another base station, communications may be lost with the particular base station. Thus, if the mobile terminal is able to establish communications with another terminal, a connection may need to be fully re-established. Accordingly, the handover may not be successfully accomplished. In such instances, a call may be dropped or discontinuities in communication may be perceived and user satisfaction with the service may be decreased.
Accordingly, despite continued efforts to improve telecommunications capabilities, there may be an existing need to improve handover procedures.